This watchdog blog, by journalist Norman Oder, offers analysis, commentary, and reportage about the $4.9 billion project to build the Barclays Center arena and 16 high-rise buildings at a crucial site in Brooklyn. Dubbed Atlantic Yards by developer Forest City Ratner in 2003, it was rebranded Pacific Park Brooklyn in 2014 after the Chinese government-owned Greenland Group bought a 70% stake in 15 towers. New York State still calls it Atlantic Yards. Note: archive at right.

Is criticism of Atlantic Center mall just 20/20 hindsight? (Nope)

So, should we give some slack to Forest City Ratner's Atlantic Center mall, which opened in 1996, a different era in an ever-changing Brooklyn? Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz, during a recent TV discussion, suggested we should: "Certainly the Atlantic [Center] mall, the first mall, you can’t say it’s an attractive mall. We all know it’s not. But when it was built, I and almost all the other elected officials were celebrating, my god, somebody is investing something in the area."

The expert quoted on the Atlantic Center was Rob Lane, Regional Design Programs, Regional Plan Association, who said, according to the article:"Seems like the focus should be on buildings and structures that are not just ugly in someone's opinion, but things that detract from, if not destroy, the most essential part of urbanity--the pedestrian experience. One example is Atlantic Center in Brooklyn. Not only is it an eyesore, it completely detracts from the walkers experience through long empty sidewalks and hallways and absolutely no street life whatsoever."

Bruce blames himself

We know Bruce Ratner's explanation for the isolation imposed in the interior, which reflects on the exterior as well. The New York Times reported 5/26/04:“It’s a problem of malls in dense urban areas that kids hang out there, and it’s not too positive for shopping,” Mr. Ratner said. “Look, here you’re in an urban area, you’re next to projects, you’ve got tough kids.”

Ultimately, however, even Bruce Ratner blames the bad design on himself, not inexorable external forces, as New York magazine's Kurt Andersen wrote in an 11/20/05 column:Until now, most of Ratner’s buildings have ranged from the uninspired to the bad, like his shopping center across from the Atlantic Yards. Even he admits the Atlantic Center mall is “not up to snuff. Philip Johnson did a first design, but I made a decision not to use him. I have to blame myself. I’ve been talking for ten years about trying to use ‘design architects’ instead of ‘developer architects.'"

In other words, it was a bottom-line decision that could have gone another way.

Get link

Facebook

Twitter

Pinterest

Google+

Email

Other Apps

Labels

Comments

Really, Ratner hasn't learned much. Atlantic Terminal mall is still a disaster in terms of design. Nearly everything about it is wrong in terms of pedestrian traffic, which is why several businesses have already gone kaput, from the Benihana's to the mattress store to what I suspect will soon be the Guitar Center and Buffalo Wild Wings.

It's like the designers had never been in a mall before. Compare this to the Time Warner Center and you can only weep at what could have been a central destination for Brooklyn shoppers.

Should we “condemn” (use eminent domain against) the “condemned” (the abhorred)?- Tear down Atlantic Center?

I mean we do tear down shopping centers and they don’t have to be very old for us to do it.- In fact, it’s guaranteed that developers are eager to tear things down when it means replacing them with the reward of more density.

Right now there is a proposal afoot to tear down the South Street Seaport mall. The proposal is to build densely out over the water, and then to explain why that maybe should be permitted, they would tear down something on land (the mall). Councilman Alan J. Gerson may wind up stopping it. (See: South Street Seaport Building Plan Faces Council Roadblock http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/19/nyregion/19seaport.html?partner=rssnyt&emc=rss)

But things don’t need to be terribly old to tear them down. Atlantic Center opened in the fall of 1996. The South Street Seaport opened just 13 years before in the summer of 1983.

If we are ready now to tear down the South Street Seaport which got undeserved acclaim when it was built maybe we can tear down the significantly worse Atlantic Center which has been justly decried from the beginning without waiting as long.- - - - It will give Ratner some land to build on and simultaneously a chance to correct mistakes rather than leave a longer trail of them behind.

Interestingly, on the Stoler shows, the same series where Marty Markowitz was making apologies for, but minimizing, Atlantic Center’s design flaws, developers have, for some time now, been striking a beat about how the South Street Seaport’s time had come, how it was old and passe. You could tell something was up. Before the fall comes the denigration! But would there be denigration without the fond hope of more density? South Street Seaport mall tenants are collectively litigating. They are charging that the mall is being intentionally mismanaged to run it into the ground.

What if we don’t tear down the Atlantic Center mall now? Well then, in 13 more years, probably before much of Atlantic Yards is ever built, it will catch up and be as old as the South Street Seaport is now. And then it will surely be ready to be torn down. The advantage to Ratner of waiting to tear it down is that he can use the interim years to acquire, tear down, and demolish other people’s property in pursuit of windfall subsidy through eminent domain abuse. He wouldn’t be able to do that if Atlantic Center were torn down now. But if he waits, then he can tear down Atlantic Center later for still more density without having to give up windfalls now.

So can we predict the transition? On the Stoler shows of today Marty Markowitz makes apologies for, but minimizes, Atlantic Center’s design flaws. In just about a decade the drumbeat will start and the developers and Marty Markowitz’s future-day equivalent instead of minimizing the Atlantic Center’s flaws will exaggerate them- And we will hear the refrain- “Atlantic Center’s time has come!”

In the meantime what does it mean to put ever more of beloved Brooklyn into Bruce Ratner’s questionable custody?

I appreciate the AYR post’s two Ratner quotes wherein the poor design of Atlantic Center is accounted for, but there is another good one that was missed where Ratner said he is not “particularly proud of” Atlantic Center: (See: “Atlantic Terminal to bridge failed mall”http://www.brooklynpaper.com/stories/27/12/27_12nets3.html)

In 2004 explaining the failures of his Atlantic Center mall (adjoining the proposed megadevelopment) Bruce Ratner said: "When I started, I did not have any understanding of the importance of architecture." It is doubtful that in a few short years Mr. Ratner has graduated from not understanding the importance of architecture to understanding the much greater complexities of megadevelopment and city building.

While that's part of the lawsuit, more prominent are claims of racial discrimination and retaliation, with black employees claiming repeated abuse by white supervisors, preferential treatment toward Hispanic colleagues, and retaliation in response to complaints.

Two individual supervisors, for example, are charged with referring to black employees as “black motherfucker,” “dumb black bitch,” “black monkey,” “piece of shit” and “nigger.”

Two have referred to an employee blind in one eye as “cyclops,” and “the one-eyed guy,” and an employee with a nose disorder as “the nose guy.”

There's been no official response yet though arena spokesman Barry Baum told the Daily News they, but take “allegations of this kind very seriously” and have "a zero tolerance policy for…

To supporters of Forest City Ratner's Atlantic Yards project, it's a long-awaited plan for long-overlooked land. "The Atlantic Yards area has been available for any developer in America for over 100 years,” declared Borough President Marty Markowitz at a 5/26/05 City Council hearing.

Charles Gargano, chairman of the Empire State Development Corporation, mused on 11/15/05 to WNYC's Brian Lehrer, “Isn’t it interesting that these railyards have sat for decades and decades and decades, and no one has done a thing about them.” Forest City Ratner spokesman Joe DePlasco, in a 12/19/04 New York Times article ("In a War of Words, One Has the Power to Wound") described the railyards as "an empty scar dividing the community."

But why exactly has the Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s Vanderbilt Yard never been developed? Do public officials have some responsibility?

At right is a photo of a poster spotted in Hasidic Williamsburg right. Clearly there's an event scheduled at the Barclays Center aimed at the Haredi Jewish community (strict Orthodox Jews who reject secular culture), but the lack of English text makes it cryptic.

The website Matzav.com explains, Protest Against Israeli Draft of Bnei Yeshiva Rescheduled for Barclays Center:
A large asifa to protest the drafting of bnei yeshiva in Eretz Yisroel into the Israeli army that had been set to take place this month will instead be held on Sunday, 17 Sivan/June 11, at the Barclays Center in Downtown Brooklyn, NY.
So attendees at a big gathering will protest an apparent change of policy that will make it much more difficult for traditional Orthodox Jewish students--both Hasidic (who follow a rebbe) and non-Hasidic (who don't)--to get deferments from the draft. Comments on the Yeshiva World website explain some of the debate.

First mentioned in April, the Atlantic Yards project in Atlanta is moving ahead--and has the potential to nudge Atlantic Yards in Brooklyn further down in Google searches.

According to a 5/30/17 press release, Hines and Invesco Real Estate Announce T3 West Midtown and Atlantic Yards:
Hines, the international real estate firm, and Invesco Real Estate, a global real estate investment manager, today announced a joint venture on behalf of one of Invesco Real Estate’s institutional clients to develop two progressive office projects in Atlanta totalling 700,000 square feet. T3 West Midtown will be a 200,000-square-foot heavy timber office development and Atlantic Yards will consist of 500,000 square feet of progressive office space in two buildings. Both projects are located on sites within Atlantic Station in the flourishing Midtown submarket.
Hines will work with Hartshorne Plunkard Architecture (HPA) as the design architect for both T3 West Midtown and Atlantic Yards. DLR Group will be t…

Pacific Park Brooklyn is seriously delayed, Forest City Realty Trust said yesterday in a news release, which further acknowledged that the project has caused a $300 million impairment, or write-down of the asset, as the expected revenues no longer exceed the carrying cost.

The Cleveland-based developer, parent of Brooklyn-based Forest City Ratner, which is a 30% investor in Pacific Park along with 70% partner/overseer Greenland USA, blamed the "significant impairment" on an oversupply of market-rate apartments, the uncertain fate of the 421-a tax break, and a continued increase in construction costs.

While the delay essentially confirms the obvious, given that two major buildings have not launched despite plans to do so, it raises significant questions about the future of the project, including:if market-rate construction is delayed, will the affordable h…

Real Estate Weekly, reporting on trends in Chinese investment in New York City, on 11/18/15 quoted Jim Costello, a senior vice president at research firm Real Capital Analytics:
“They’re typically building high-end condos, build it and sell it. Capital return is in a few years. That’s something that is ingrained in the companies that have been coming here because that’s how they’ve grown in the last 35 years. It’s always been a development game for them. So they’re just repeating their business model here,” he said.
When I read that last November, I didn't think it necessarily applied to Atlantic Yards/Pacific Park, now 70% owned (outside of the Barclays Center and B2 modular apartment tower), by the Greenland Group, owned significantly by the Shanghai government.
A majority of the buildings will be rentals, some 100% market, some 100% affordable, and several--the last several built--are supposed to be 50% market/50% subsidized. (See tentative timetable below.)Selling development …

Click on graphic to enlarge. This is post-dated to stay at the top of the blog. It will be updated as announced configurations change and buildings launch. The August 2014 tentative configurations proposed by developer Greenland Forest City Partners will change, and the project is already well behind that tentative timetable.